Beloved, My Beloved by Elizabeth Barrett Browning (Poem & Explanation)

 

Beloved, My Beloved

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

(Poem & Explanation) 

Beloved, My Beloved

Beloved, my Beloved, when I think

That thou wast in the world a year ago,

What time I sate alone here in the snow

And saw no footprint, heard the silence sink

No moment at thy voice... but, link by link,

Went counting all my chains, as if that so

They never could fall off at any blow

Struck by thy possible hand... why, thus I drink

Of life’s great cup of wonder! Wonderful,

Never to feel thee thrill the day or night

With personal act or speech,- nor ever cull

Some prescience of thee with the blossoms white

Thou sawest growing ! Atheists are as dull,

Who cannot guess God’s presence out of sight.

 

Sonnets from the Portuguese is a collection of 44 sonnets dedicated to Robert Browning, her husband. Written before marriage the collection was published in 1851. It reverses the traditional pattern of a (male) poet-lover wooing the unresponding or unattainable lady love. In these sonnets the female poet-lover woos her beloved. There are references to personal experiences, and feelings - of hope, fear betrayal, pain of an uncertain future and the deep sense of devotion, happiness etc., but the personal emotions are carefully presented in the form of conventional sonnet- the poet-lover expresses her love in a controlled form and tone.

Explanation

The poet expresses her sense of wonder at the fact that though she had been alive she had no knowledge of the existence of her beloved a year before she met him. She imagines that she is sitting alone, surrounded by snow on all sides. In such a landscape, there were no footprints or sound to mark his presence or coming. In her loneliness she counted the links of all the chains that held her captive. In the last 6 lines her sense of surprise at coming to know him, becomes a justification in believing the possibility of love, even prior to one’s actual knowledge/experience of love. Similarly unquestioning faith leads one to believe in the presence of God, even though one may not see Him.

The poem brings together belief in the possibility of love through imagination and knowledge of abstract ideas. Emotions and ideals cannot be related only to physical, empirical and sensory experiences. One’s knowledge does not depend on what one directly knows. Those who doubt the existence of God giving the reason of empirical reason are mocked at.

“Why thus I drink the great cup of wonder” - the line means: that the poet imagines life to be a cup from which she drinks the experiences. She now drinks (feels) the sense of wonder at her having lived life without knowing the beloved. After knowing the Beloved, she realizes what a great change has come to her life. It is now full of joy and a sense of freedom.

“Nor ever cull...... growing” - the line means that the poet is surprised at her own lack of imagination; that she did not think about the presence or existence of a person like her Beloved from the beautiful objects around her, like the flowers. She did not have the foresight to think about love before she actually met him and began to love him.

The poet’s sense of pleasant surprise at the discovery of the existence of the beloved contrasts with the lack of imagination in an atheist (one who does not believe in the existence of God). Faith and imagination fill life with new wonders and happiness. She contrasts the sadness in her life, which was like a bondage, to the happiness that has come with him.